Repetition In Folklore

o Repetition in threes found commonly in folklore in her depiction of Janie’s marriages – respectively with Logan Killicks, Joe Stark and Teacake. o Repetition in threes found commonly in folklore in Jonah’s Gourd Vine, where John respectively married to Lucy Potts, Hattie Tyson and Sally Lovelace. o Repetition in threes found commonly in folklore in her depiction of Janie’s communities – with Janie’s movement out of the rural community of her Nanny and her first husband, to the town of Eatonville where she keeps a store with Joe Starks and finally with Teacake at the muck in Everglades, where she experiences joy and bereavement.
• Effect: Helps build up the tension to the story as well as allowing the main character to express personal

o Certain animals have symbolic weight in Their Eyes Were Watching God. The animal with the greatest symbolic charge in this novel is the mule. Mentioned frequently throughout “Their Eyes Were Watching God”, the mule obviously represents the carrier of heavy loads and burdens, but it also represent stubbornness and resistance.
• The use of the mule imagery indicate the way in which African American females have been mistreated and dehumanized in the society. It is simply the relationship between “the white man and the black man” and “the black man and the black woman”. This can be seen clearly through Nanny’s view of the situation when she says, “So de white man throw down de load and tell de nigger man tuh pick it up. He pick it up because he have to, but he don’t tote it. He hand it to his women folks, De nigger woman is de mule oh de world as fur as Ah can see.” (Hurston

Hurston intersperses folk music throughout the novel, most notably in a party scene at Alf Pearson’s plantation. Hurston describes the music as “furious music of the little drum whose body was still in Africa, but whose soul sung around a fire in Alabama” (30). The folk songs that Hurston collected in the 1920s and 30s had roots in Africa, but were adapted to Southern culture. The songs mention Tennessee, Florida and Illinois as well as North American animals such as cows, raccoons and possums, yet are based on African songs and played on African instruments. Hurston would have actually collected these songs in communities similar to those in the novel. Whereas many authors may include music or lyrics to enhance their writing, Hurston’s use of music is necessary for her to portray Southern culture as accurately as she recorded